Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has lowered himself to baiting his critics – trying to lure them into apparent displays of anti-Semitism – by paraphrasing Nazi tyrant Adolf Hitler in a comment on Twitter.

He stated, in a sabre-rattling speech aimed at Iran: “The weak crumble, are slaughtered and are erased from history while the strong, for good or for ill, survive. The strong are respected, and alliances are made with the strong, and in the end peace is made with the strong.”

The weak crumble, are slaughtered and are erased from history while the strong, for good or for ill, survive. The strong are respected, and alliances are made with the strong, and in the end peace is made with the strong.

As you can see from the response by Evolve Politics, Hitler said something almost identical in 1923: “The whole of nature is a mighty struggle between strength and weakness, an eternal victory of the strong over the weak.”

The IHRA definition of anti-Semitism forbids people from stating the fact that Hitler said something almost identical in 1923:

“The whole of nature is a mighty struggle between strength and weakness, an eternal victory of the strong over the weak” – Hitler, 1923 Munich Speech https://t.co/EdZvPmPdp7

It is true that one of the examples of anti-Semitism listed with the IHRA working definition is “drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis”.

For some, that would be enough. We know several right-wing Labour MPs who would scream “anti-Semitism” if anybody compared Netanyahu with Hitler.

However – and this is a biggie:

The working definition of anti-Semitism itself states that examples such as that listed above are “non-legally binding”, only “to guide IHRA in its work”, and are indications of what “might” be manifestations, “taking into account the overall context”.

So – as Martin Odoni clarifies in this Critique Archives article, “the notorious ‘examples’ in the IHRA definition… are not meant to be seen as cast-iron proof of anti-Semitic attitudes. They are merely meant to be seen as clues for ‘where to look’, as it were. Where these behaviours are seen, the person or people demonstrating them might be anti-Semitic in their intentions, and so it is advisable to investigate.”

So the IHRA accepts that drawing comparisons between contemporary Israeli policy and that of the Nazis may not be inherently anti-Semitic – and one occasion in which it most certainly would not is if the Israeli prime minister paraphrased the words of Hitler.

Furthermore, such behaviour encourages unfavourable analysis of Israeli policy towards the Palestinians – not direct comparisons with the Nazis’ persecution of European Jews, although it is clear that, as Hitler believed the Jews to be weak, Netanyahu applies the same description to Palestinians.

So, in context, there is nothing anti-Semitic about this tweet by Craig Murray, no matter how much the pro-Israeli-government lobby rages about it.

A genuine statement of fascist ideology from the apartheid state which categorises its own citizens and their rights and even internal movement by ethnicity, and inflicts constant terror on the "weak" Palestinians it displaced into large fenced and blockaded enclosures. https://t.co/xne1zqteQ6

Anyone who wonders why people criticise Israel should read THIS from the Israeli Prime Minister.He is referring to the murder of Palestinian women & children, the erasing of the very word Palestine & assuming “racial superiority” for his “race”. Not Good! https://t.co/zjkUn2b86G

Marcus Chown’s comment can’t be touched because not only is he absolutely right, but he actually places Netanyahu’s remarks in their correct context:

FFS. This could be Hitler talking about the master race. This is the kind of thinking that led to eugenics. Given the suffering of the Jews under the Nazis, the PM of Israel is the last person on Earth I would expect to be saying things like this. https://t.co/4AYBNINSC2

We are told – constantly – that the Nazi persecution of the Jews is, indeed, hateful to the Jews.

But the leader of what he himself has described as the “nation-state of the Jewish people” has not only embraced the rhetoric that informed that persecution – he uses it to justify doing what is hateful to his own neighbours in Palestine.

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11 thoughts on “Netanyahu echoes Hitler. Will his followers call ‘anti-Semitism!’ on those who point this out?”

Hajo Meyer said, at one of the many conferences for which Jeremy Corbyn’s attendance landed him in trouble, that what he was hearing from the Israeli Government, about Palestinians, was what was said about him in Nazi Germany. For that, he was branded anti-Semitic, despite having survived 10 months in Auschwitz.
Kenneth Stern, who was chiefly responsible for this “working definition” and its associated examples, himself said, in an open letter, in 2011:
“The “working definition” is a useful tool to identify statements that merit attention on campus, but deciding whether a given remark is antisemitic can require careful attention to rhetoric, context, and even intent. As the AAUP has suggested, even objectionable statements can have content worthy of debate. Most individual remarks, moreover, do not rise to the level of creating hostile environments.”
Interestingly, he said this, too, which the N.E.C. might want to take note of:
“By trying to censor anti-Israel remarks, it becomes more, not less, difficult to tackle both antisemitism and anti-Israel dogma.”
This singular definition (or anything that people might consider to be offensive) is being used as a stick with which to beat people; that was never its intent: ” The definition was never intended to be used to limit speech on a college campus; it was written for European data collectors to have a guideline for what to include and what to exclude in reports.” “It is a perversion of the definition to use it, as some are doing, in an attempt to censor what a professor, student, or speaker can say.. To assert this not only contravenes the definition’s purpose (it was not drafted to label anyone an antisemite or to limit campus speech), it also harms the battle against antisemitism.”
This is perhaps the most interesting statement: “It can, for example, be a starting point for needed discussions about antisemitism and how we define it.” Other than the fact that Kenneth Stern always refers to it as a “working definition,” this statement highlights that fact that it does not ultimately define anti-Semitism. That being the case, why are people so keen that £abour adopts it? Have any other Parties adopted it into their codes of conduct? Interesting, that.

He’s meddling in British politics. There’s evidence to suggest he’s part of the Corbyn smear campaign. Furthermore I now wonder what the appalling Priti Patel was doing in Israel. She was paid off £17K, was she orchestrating this campaign?

This is one of the things that Hayo Mayer was saying; it used to be anti-Judaism; he said that “anti-Semitism” came out of Nazi pseudo-science. The fact that “the Jews” are not a race makes no sense of the word in those terms.

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